Captain’s Blog 20 January 2017

Lights, Taree, Shoes, Coaching, LTR, Wombat, Video of the week

Lights needed again

Although it’s still mid-summer the days are of course steadily getting shorter. This morning sunrise was at 5.57am. On Sunday it will be at 6.00am.

As you know, lights are compulsory on boats before sunrise (and after sunset).

If you need to buy a pair of lights, why not contact MRC member, Dave Wear, at dwear@dwear.com.au?

Taree regatta this weekend

A large contingent of younger members from Linda’s squad and also masters are heading to the Taree regatta this weekend. Good luck to everyone!

The following quads/fours/doubles/pairs are on trailers and not available till Monday morning. They should have, by now, been booked in the SNB system to indicate this.

2x /-

Zouba
Campbell
Hardcastle
Garratt
Brown
Goodrich
Blay

4x/-

Tenacity
Bromley
Jenner

Keep the shoes dry when washing down boats

Please take care not to wet the shoes when washing down boats. Repeated wetting and drying drastically shortens the life of the shoes and promotes mould.

Coaching clarification

Some members have asked for clarification of the committee’s decision about members using club boats and tinnies to coach relatives and friends.

There has been no blanket ban of this activity. The committee encourages such coaching but requires members wanting to use tinnies and boats to first get permission from the club captain or Director of Rowing.

Working bee on Saturday, 21 January

As mentioned last week, there will be a working bee at the club from 8.30am to (no later than) 10am on Saturday, 21 January.

So far about 10 members have volunteered to attend which is great. If you would like to help please notify me so that the organisers can make proper preparations.

The last thing we want is for, say 20, additional people to show up unexpectedly. This will lead to a shambles and, in all likelihood, not enough supplies to get things done efficiently. Then, people will say the working bee was a dud and be less inclined to attend the next one.

Learn to Row Coaches Still Needed for Term One

We are still short LTR coaches for the upcoming term which runs for eight weeks from 4 February to 26 March (i.e. every weekend in March and February).

There are three time slots to choose from:

Saturday 8.30am

Sunday 6.30am

Sunday 8.00am

If you can help, please let me know ASAP.

Wombat award

To the rowers who have been using the kitchen and not tidying up properly (including emptying the garbage bin regularly). There were rat droppings at the top of the stairs in the old shed this morning.

As part of next weekend’s working bee all food in the kitchen will be tossed unless it is clearly marked with a member’s name.

Video of the week

Here’s a short video of the 2015 Canadian Lightweight Four.

A number of members said they enjoyed the Pike’s Peak rally driving video which I sent before Christmas. So, in similar vein, here’s some footage of the Isle of Man TT motor cycle race which is reputedly the most dangerous event in the world. It’s been run for 100 years or so and in that time more than 250 riders (and spectators) have been killed. There is only one crash in this video but you can see how dangerous the racing is. 300+km/h per hour through villages and down country roads with no safety barriers is not for me.

By Ed Day|
2017-01-27T11:23:22+00:00 January 20th, 2017|Captain's Blog|Comments Off on Captain’s Blog 20 January 2017